


Light

by dustd



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Ficlet, Friendship, Gen, Good Morgana (Merlin)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:28:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21992947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustd/pseuds/dustd
Summary: Magic practise.
Relationships: Merlin & Morgana (Merlin)
Kudos: 36





	Light

A single brown feather levitated out of the pile on Merlin’s bed, paused shakily about two feet up, then abruptly shot across the room.

“ _Damn_.”

“What d’you mean, that was great! You almost held it still!”

Morgana appreciated his excitement, but 'almost' was a frustrating stage to be stuck in.

Currently, she was practising control on the innards of a pillow – in of all places, Merlin’s room, with of all people, Merlin. Unbeknownst to most, he was a sorcerer with considerable natural ability, and was the only person who hadn’t flinched when Morgana’s eyes glowed gold in front of him. They practised together when they could.

Morgana tried again, keeping her eyes focused on just one feather amongst hundreds before speaking the words of the simple spell. The language of the Old Religion came naturally to her; she never had any trouble with the pronunciation.

There was a tiny flicker in the air which the average person would not feel, and the chosen feather rose.

The tricky thing was keeping it steady. It’s size and weight – shorter than Morgana’s little finger, and as light as… well… – made it very hard to concentrate on. It was like trying to pinch a stray hair from a completely flat surface when she let her nails grow long.

Slowly, frustratingly slowly, the feather wobbled its way towards her. The room wasn’t big, but it was enough of a journey to give her trouble, between the bed and the wall against which they stood. Across the room the window was shuttered (it was too high to see through from outside, but as she had said to Merlin, you could never be too careful).

Finally, with more effort than she would like, it arrived in front of her. She held out her hand, relaxing her mind to let it land softly on her palm. She looked at Merlin. He grinned back.

“Knew you’d do it.”

“Only just…” But she was smiling.

“It’ll get easier. I’m sure of it.”

She tried to believe him. It was just so _frustrating._

With a bright flash of her eyes, Morgana spoke the spell again, and the whole pile of feathers burst into the air in a silent explosion.

She’d wanted to do that for the past hour – it was not power she lacked, just refinement in using it.

Merlin laughed, then raised his eyebrows with his own gold flash of magic, one that made the feathers spread out to fill the room, then hang there in mid-air. Morgana gazed around in wonder.

“How do you do that?”

Annoyingly, he shrugged, like it was nothing. “A lot of it is thinking what you _want_ to happen, and then… making the spells that you know do that for you.”

“But you didn’t say anything.”

He shrugged again, and she tutted. As much as she appreciated his guidance, he wasn’t the best teacher. Magic seemed to be second nature to him, like breathing, or growing hair, and you couldn’t exactly teach away a person’s baldness.

Morgana still looked at her friend with a mix of wonder and puzzlement, and no small amount of envy. It had taken time to come to terms with, following the night she had come to the physician's chambers desperate for a stronger sleeping draught, and he had broken his promise to Gaius to keep her in the dark. What she didn’t understand was how easily _Gwen_ had accepted the fact Merlin was secretly a powerful sorcerer; Morgana was sure in her place she would have been a bit put out that he’d never offered to zap all the dusting done or something.

There was a tentative knock on the door. Both their heads whipped round, the feathers coming unstuck from the air and floating to the floor like a strange, murky snowfall.

“Merlin…?”

It was Gaius. Morgana subconsciously set her shoulders. She did not know if she would ever feel easy around the physician again, now she knew the truth about her dreams.

He opened the door slowly, giving them time to hide anything too incriminating if they should need to. Once over the threshold he stopped short, looking around in confusion.

“Where on earth have all these feathers come from?”

“Erm, a pillow exploded?”

“Since when do you have feather pillows?”

Morgana looked at Merlin curiously.

“Arthur’s pillow exploded,” he amended.

Gaius seemed to think it wasn’t worth investigating how such a thing might happen. “I see. Speaking of Arthur…”

Merlin groaned. “What does he want? Is it important? Because we’re in the middle of something.”

Gaius glanced at Morgana, aware that she might not appreciate such glibness from a servant. He didn’t know that she’d heard much worse during her time alone with Merlin. Far from being offended, she was glad that Arthur had someone who kept him grounded (the frank and guileless way Merlin did it was an entertaining bonus).

“Merlin. The Crown Prince needs your assistance. So hop to it.”

Gaius left the door ajar behind him.

Merlin sighed. “Probably wants someone to hit with a sword.”

Arthur, as yet, had no idea that two of the people closest to him had magic.

“What should we do about this?” Morgana asked, looking around at the scattered feathers. The ones near the door were fluttering slightly in a draft.

Merlin thought for a moment, tapping his chin.

The words he muttered brought forth a concentrated whirlwind, sweeping the feathers up into a rapidly turning column over the bed and catching at Morgana’s hair and silk skirts. He muttered something else, and they fell all at once with a soft _fwumph_. The pile might be a bit dustier than before, but they were all in one place.

“Show off,” Morgana said airily, heading for the door. She paused, “If Arthur does want you for training, make him miss from me won’t you?”

“Of course, my lady,” Merlin said, earnestly.

A second later he grinned.

**Author's Note:**

> I just realised that this was almost definitely subconsciously inspired by that one scene in The Vampire Diaries. Woops!
> 
> Thanks for reading :)


End file.
